The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1887-05-21

OF a stone l am under stone myself. o,
for Just breath of air from some point a
little way up the skyn' l began to hate, /
say the long green grass fields and then /
began to hate the farm life. sit is dull,
sordid, base work, let them say what they
please l said, "from the pitching about of
the barn-yard muck to the last results of it.
1t is all nonsense about its being the one
noble occupation. So is the cooks, then,
too" And hated the great cattle in the
yard, the smell of the frothing pals OF
milk, the click of the stanchions, the cheese.
making, the er-packing-every thing
that belonged to all the dull round Of the
farm duties. / went about to see the work
done, and said word to the maids here
the men there; and l went and sat down bv
my kindling autumn fire, and felt that if ]
had to live here forever, had better die
and be done with it. | had rather die and
be done with it anyway, il l was never tt
see Mark any more; but then that was nc
new feeling.
Do what 1 would, my thoughts would
follow Mark. Was he there alone in his
fathers housed Was he riding gayly round
the country, visiting other houses, other
girls happier than |, hearing music, Joining
in laughter! Or was he travelling off il
distant regions, seeing new sights and for
getting the old, forgetting the past and mt
in fresh experiences! Or was he sitting a
home there in the long dim room whose
windows looked through the pine-wood vista
over the broad valley and away to blu,
mountains! No one told me; no one evel
ventured to mention his name to me. Blu
somehow placed him there in the long din
nd Fol
him and lowering about him. Now he sal
by the fireside there, in the deep chair
reading; now he was busy with maps nd
pictures at the table; now, in the big by,
the moonlight, that had pale green rflec-
tions in it cast up from the emerald dpths
of the woods below, fell about him. ldare
say that, in reality, busy about theplace
and his affairs of one sort OF anothf, and
doing his best to live and to forget, 40 was
very little in that room; but there Z chose
to place him; and it grew strange sweet
to me, and every moment when l Ould sit
down alone my fancy took me sd l sat
down in that room, or else l waIlered up
and down the great staircase an the hall
where his peoples portraits hug; but l
always came back again to the barth ofthe
long dim room If it were qy, to the
dancing fire-cast shadows tere if it
were night, and the place gew dearer
and dearer to me every hour, and
| upbraded myself in thughts too
bitter for speech for the folly and angry
temper that had shut me out oft, that had
drawn comparison between hat ancient
lofty place and this low and tireome stretch
of nothing but common grass lads, between
that manor and this plain farmhouse, al
though in real truth my farmhouse was
quite its equal at any other tine. But the
new year came in wlthouta sim from Mark
or sign from me; and the country was
white with snow, and the liver ice was
strong enough to bear up sletges and teams
of horses and the ice-boats vent splitting
the wind before them 1t all made no odds
to me. | was completely Wreched. | didn't
pretend to go to church or TO any Of the So
ciety meetings.; and if the 6awyers and
Wellses came to me suppose reated them
properly-I'm sure l don't knov-but nev-
er set my foot out doors the winter long
There were furious storms that winter.
The snow fell as [ never remembered it be-
fore. The drifts seemed to wal US in from
all the world. ga living tomb, used to
murmur. II wish it were tomb indeed,
and in my last sleep" At tweIty one can
be so very miserable; and at thirty, if one
lives so long, one can be so proiane as to
laugh at it,
Sometimes Bryan and Thomas brought
word of the outside regions, OF the way pee
pie up-river were sleighriding over tie
tops of fences, of the immense snowfall n
the mountains, and the fears OF what would
happen from it in the spring if there should
be an early thaw. And | remembered some
words that Mark used to quote from a pls
he had seen. "When this snow meltetl
there shall come afood." didn't care how
many floods came.
And so, with storm after storm, tn
winter wore away, Jane and Maria at thei
housekeeping tasks, and | busy with m,
rug-making, hooking strips of wooden clotI
through coffee bags, not because the hous
was not full of them, but because l hat
nothing better to do For couldn't read
if | tried, my eyes swan and l could no
make out word of what 1T was all about
And people went and came like shadows
and the days had grown short, and nov
they grew long, and what did it all matter
to me.
March had come, but without sign o
the winters breaking; and then at las
April loitered on, and April suns began t.
do their work; and gradually the drifts o
snow in the lanes and in the fields began t.
settle and to lessen and melt and disappear
And Bryan and Thomas had to talk of tn
brooding hens, and watch for the breaking
up of the river, and discuss the chance o
the early rye and the new calves and tn
hiring of the spring hands; and it was al
| emptiness. And one day it began to snow
and the snow turned to rain, and it rainel
that day and rained in rivers, and it rainet
the next day, and it rained till it had rainet
a week-a long, dreary week that babe fai
to end only in deluge And on Saturda
the sun came out warm; and when looked
the crocuses bloomed under the windows
and Thomas SAID it was very like the May
flowers were opening in the woods, if any
body could get to them for the roads al
being under water, although the river wa
still locked in solid ice from shore to shore
And in the late afternoon of the SECOND
| day of this same sweet sunshine and soutl
wind, as we sat there, Jane and l. Mari;
ran in and said there was water in the eel
lar, as much as six inches.
THAT is nothing" said |. 81 should thin
there would be, after such melting o
snow and such a raining Of torrents"
cts more likely it's the land sucking u
the river, MISS said Maria. 1.-THE river
| just raging full under it's ice coat,
shouldn't wonder, and is letting itself on
there came great shock and thrill, rum
BILE, roar, and a mighty burst of sound.
"Great mercy, miss!n cried Jane, cit